If it's secret, and in Scotland…

Unfortunately not credited, so I can’t give the proper source either, but it does seem appropriate and worth sharing.

Adam West Tribute

While the later films and animated series may have had higher and more sophisticated production values, I think West’s 1960s TV series was, and is, the definitive conversion of the original comic series, and all the little quirky touches were inspired by that original.

While I get the later ‘darkening’ of the Dark Knight, I also think it made the story too deep and too serious compared to the original.

The original had the right mix of light-heartedness, comedy, and fun, to make the mad super villains that were Batman’s foes work perfectly.

The only other version that really worked for me was an animated series that was shown during kids’ TV on Saturday morning.

Sad to say I don’t know the year, or which animated series it was.

The reason I remember it was when I realised how serious it was, after I had just started watching it as a series for little kiddies.

After a few weeks, I began to see that the episodes appeared to work on two levels: the obvious one that for the kids; but also a much darker theme linking the Batman and his adversaries.

It may just have been me, but while there was the outward fun of cartoon for the kids, I began to see a more serious storyline underlying the obvious., with both the Batman and the villains appearing to stop just short of actions that would, I think, have placed the series not as Saturday morning kids’ TV, but as a post watershed (9 pm in the UK) adult TV series.

Share this:

Like this:

I never saw any of the pollution which once afflicted the River Clyde, which served as little more than a handy dump for all the chemicals and other effluents that poured forth from the industrialised and increasingly populated areas that bordered the river around late 19th and early 20th centuries. But I have seen the pictures, and they are grim – smoke and soot heading towards the sky to return to Glasgow when it rained, turning the city black, and outflows discharging directly into the river with no treatment for chemicals or ‘other’ content, poisoning the water, not to mention the surrounding ground.

That’s all gone of course, and even fairly recent pics of places such as Dalmarnock can show an unrecognisable view, today largely flat and green, but even in the 1960s packed with factories, rail terminals, coal-fired power stations, and even tenements jammed in between them.

The River Clyde was almost killed by such places all along its industrialised length, with flora and fauna unable to cope.

I don’t think it was all that long ago I happened to read news of the first salmon being found in the recovering river, and the river banks are now covered with assorted greenery (unfortunately including vast swathes of deadly Giant Hogweed), fish continue to return, and walk along the river often find swans and ducks swimming and feeding there.

This control gate lies abandoned at Carmyle, where it once controlled the weir next to a bleachworks, which must have been a major source of pollution in its day, when the river water would have been used for washing and rinsing, then simply dumped back into the river.

Carmyle Weir Gate

Salmon are able to access parts of the River Clyde for the first time in decades following work to improve water quality and remove barriers.

The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa) said millions of pounds of investment had reduced pollution and restored habitats.

The work has also put an end to the Clyde’s “stench”, Environment Secretary Roseanna Cunningham said.

Water quality has gone from “bad” to “moderate” – and “excellent” in places.

About 100km (62 miles) of waterways has also been opened up to migratory fish.

Sepa, which monitors the water quality of Scotland’s lochs and rivers, reported that the River Clyde was in “significantly better health than expected”.

Between 2010 and 2021, Scottish Water will have invested more than £600m in wastewater treatment works and sewerage systems in the area.

And the Scottish government’s Water Environment Fund has helped restore habitats by removing fish barriers and concrete channels.

This has allowed salmon to access the upper reaches of the Clyde catchment.

The fund has spent £3.1m on river restoration projects near Hamilton and Shotts, with more investment planned this year.

…

Ms Cunningham added: “That hard work and investment has seen water quality improve, aquatic species return to the waters, and an end to the stench which once made residents’ lives a misery.”

Granted their claims are true, but I’ve been walking various parts of the industrialised River Clyde for years, from Daldowie to the firth, and can’t recall coming across a ‘stench’ anywhere along the river side or walkway path.

Ms Cunningham’s statement gives a false impression that this is something recent, and that the people of Glasgow have lived with the ‘stench’ until recently, and fails to note that such extremes were dealt with decades ago.

She should try walking past some of the private waste contractors we now have to live with in our midst – such as the one across the road from Emirates Arena at Parkhead.

I wondered where the ‘stench’ was coming from as I walked there recently, and only realised where the source was while looking at Google Earth.

Share this:

Like this:

About

Secret Scotland aims to provide a common resource where secret, hidden or otherwise notable Points of Interest around Scotland may be recorded and shared, and is modelled after the class-leading Wikipedia format.

By secret or hidden, we’re really just referring to anything that might be described as lost, unknown, uninvestigated, unexplained, undiscovered, unexplored, forgotten, undisclosed, underground, subterranean, camouflaged, disguised, suppressed, or similar. In simple terms, it could just be something (or somewhere) that’s just a bit out of the ordinary, and might not be noticed if not highlighted. As inspiration, these are a few of the existing Categories: